Upgrade of 30-year-old Grumbach incubator

Introduction

We were asked by a well established falconry centre, who is a long standing customer, to service, upgrade and modify a Grumbach incubator which was in excess of 30 years old, dating from 1980s. Although old, the unit was in surprisingly good condition and up until its current fault of worn potentiometers, had given very reliable service.

Grumbach as it arrived

Grumbach incubation chamber

Grumbach wiring

Grumbach old controls from the rear

Grumbach old turning control

Grumbach turning trays

Serviced controls and wiring

Old modified turning motor and housing

New control panel

New control panel switched on

Assessment

The first thing, as with all our workshop servicing and repairs, was to asses the equipment and report to the customer our findings. This unit was suffering from worn temperature adjustment potentiometers meaning the temperature control was erratic and very hard to stabilise. The unit had also had a turning modification in its past and was not original. The wiring was very untidy and was not to UK safety standards and the whole modification needed to be replaced. Due to this modification, the original wiring loom of the incubator had been disturbed and needed tidying up at the same time as replacing the turning system.

Work Order

It was decided by the customer that a full control replacement and upgrade was their best course of action and at the same time replace the turning control with our ‘Chicktec Advance Turning Upgrade’ This would give the customer Grumbach's latest ‘set & display’ temperature and humidity control and the turning control upgrade would give control of turning angle, turn delay, manual turn, a digital turning count and a visual cycle indication so that a manual check of the unit turning automatically could be timed correctly, as well as turning much faster, taking under 2 minutes per stroke as apposed to Grumbach's standard 30 minutes. Once completed we would then run and check all the afore mentioned features by leaving on test and, once satisfied, replace the air filter and calibrate the temperature and humidity.

Completion

On completion the incubator was cleaned, disinfected, shrink wrapped and packed into a box with chippings and then onto a pallet ready for dispatch back to customer ,which was done via our trusted transit carriers on a standard 24Hr next working day delivery. The whole job from start to finish was 14 days and at the end our customer is very happy with the results.